In the past decade, reality television has evolved from a programming renegade into a primetime staple of network lineups. For shows such as “The Real World” — still going strong after nearly two decades, with its latest edition premiering Wednesday — there is no shortage of willing participants.

But before the cameras begin to roll, reality show hopefuls must agree to incredibly thorough contracts, with little room for negotiation.

They know from the outset that, from a legal standpoint, it’s not the fault of the production company if they get into in a bar fight, contract a sexually transmitted disease from a cast member or simply find the show to be more emotionally damaging than they ever thought it would be.

While the needs and issues for each show are unique, a typical contract includes “100 reasons why you can’t sue,” said Eric Goldman, an assistant professor who teaches contract law at Santa Clara University’s law school.

“They’re also going to try and say, ‘If you’re creative enough to come up with the 101st reason, you can’t sue us for that either,’ “Goldman said. “These contracts are usually all-encompassing in their efforts to get their participants to waive rights to release claims.”

Producers have to be thorough, said Sonny Hutchison, co-creative officer of High Noon Entertainment, because potential participants “don’t always know what they’re getting into. The situations and some of the scenes that we come up with are still being developed or are developed after our participants sign on.”

High Noon Entertainment, which produces shows including VH1’s “Tough Love,” follows the industry standard of conducting extensive background checks plus physical and psychological exams while weeding through show hopefuls to prevent potential mishaps as much as possible.

Even with healthy participants, producers and attorneys for athletic or physically demanding shows in particular have to break down all of the horrible things that can go wrong before asking the would-be cast member to sign on the dotted line. If there’s even a remote possibility that you could die on the show, it definitely won’t be buried in the fine print.

“You have to sit there in all of your paranoia and think about what could possibly happen if the worst disaster in the world happened and you have to disclose that in a way so they know what they’re waiving and you don’t get sued,” said Steven Katleman, an entertainment and media attorney .

If something detrimental were to happen — even if it’s something like a twisted ankle after tripping over a camera cable backstage — production companies typically have insurance to cover the damage.

“We make sure that medical coverage is available, if needed,” Hutchison said, “and that’s for crew or participants. As a company, you need to be ready with worker’s comp coverage, and crews typically know what facilities are close by.”

On live-in reality shows, the concern is extended to the drama of the cast’s social interactions.

“When you’re living in the house together, you have to worry about living in a house of complete strangers who have been selected to create conflict in a hermetically sealed and stressful environment,” Katleman said. “That can lead to a lot of emotional distress on the part of the contestants. You have to cover those things in the release; you have to explain to them that you’re going to be living in this house in a stressful situation. If you’re in a situation where there are potential hookups, you have to disclose to them that it’s possible that there will be sexually transmitted diseases. That also has to be included in the release.”

Potential reality show participants also need to be clear that they’re waiving some rights to privacy. “We ask them to understand that they may be exposed to invasion of privacy,” Hutchison said. “They’re going to give up certain elements of privacy, not all, because we respect our participants. The cameras aren’t going to roll 24 hours a day.”

The cameras will be there to catch the everyday embarrassments — like when you’ve woken up with a horrible case of bedhead — but they won’t accompany you into a bathroom stall. “The boundaries have been stretched on reality television, there’s no question, but honestly, in terms of ethical behavior, the line has been drawn,” Hutchison said.

When it comes to competitive reality shows, Goldman said, the contract is the production company’s way of controlling the value of a potential star.

“To the extent that we’ve learned anything from reality TV show contracts, it’s that there is a star-making effect to those shows. A production company would want to control the value of an individual by [contracting] if they become a breakout star; we get the money from what we helped create.”

While each contract is drafted specifically for a particular show with the input of the production company and the show’s network, there’s a staple in nearly every reality show contract, and it’s also the most obvious: Should you choose to go on a reality show, your contract will stipulate that the production company has the right to portray your image in any way, shape or form.

“You’re giving up a right of publicity,” said employment attorney Kelly Scott, who does not counsel High Noon Entertainment or “The Real World.” “You’re allowing them to use your face and name in the advertising, the promotion, the packaging and the repackaging of the show.”

This clause has to be there, Hutchison said, because “the network needs to be able to exploit the material for their purposes. There’s a big investment in these shows, and they need to be able to use the material, typically in perpetuity.”

When you agree to that, you’re also wholeheartedly agreeing to the prospect of being portrayed in an unfavorable light.

“The network doesn’t want to be in the overall position where they get into a dispute with the subject if they don’t like the way they’re portrayed. This isn’t like watching a court transcript — these [shows] are edited to create a dramatic effect,” Katleman said.

“Because of that, it’s essential that the participant gives a full and complete release of any claims arising from how they’re portrayed, and the release agreements aren’t subtle,” he said. “They will not say in passing, ‘Oh, by the way, you’re going to waive defamation’; they’re going to say, ‘the show will be edited, you may find your portrayal to be embarrassing, humiliating, negative, defamatory,’ and they really want to make it very, very clear what they’re waiving.”

And, unless you are already a celebrity, you don’t really have much leverage when it comes to your contract.

“[Participants] have no bargaining power,” Scott said. “They’re anxious to have this happen for them, and they’re willing to sign over a lot. As long as the contract isn’t egregious, [production companies] get away with it. Few people have been successful in breaking them.”

Even so, Hutchinson said, production companies will negotiate on occasion.

But he said negotiations are rare for novice cast members, because “it’s difficult to treat one [cast member] differently than the other, and you’re setting yourself up for issues later.”

So in most cases, potential participants either accept the terms as they are or let another hopeful take their place.

“In general,” Goldman said, “when courts are presented with a contract and people are saying, ‘I don’t like the deal I struck with this reality show,’ most of the time those contracts are going to be upheld because everyone knows what’s going on.

“It’s hard to engender sympathy of a judge when we all know that the person signed up willingly and enthusiastically for a reason that was clearly valuable to the participant,”

Excellence reigned on shows from ‘CSI’ to ‘Lost’ to ‘American Idol’

Mostly excellent, all of them memorable, here are the decade’s Top 10 television achievements as tapped by the TV writers of The Associated Press.

In no particular order, they are:

“CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” (premiered October 2000) and the franchise it inspired. This drama was already a surprise hit when, with season two, it emerged as a reassuring response to the sorrows and anxieties of 9/11. The Las Vegas-based investigators functioned with a clinical detachment from evil and evildoers, while insisting that truth and justice await those who pursue it with keen-eyed devotion. That was just the sort of reminder viewers needed. And apparently still do, with “CSI” remaining a powerhouse, along with its spinoffs, “CSI: Miami” (premiered September 2002) and “CSI: NY” (September 2004), where science, reason (plus blood-and-guts) prevail.

“The Daily Show With Jon Stewart” (yes, we know he came aboard in 1999) and “The Colbert Report” (premiered October 2005). Weeknights on Comedy Central, this one-two satirical punch helps keep viewers abreast of all the foolishness they suffer at the hands of the media — and at the hands of newsmakers the media cover.

“Survivor” (premiered May 2000). It began with personalities such as Rudy, Richard, Susan and, of course, host Jeff Probst, on an island near Borneo. Now, 18-and-counting editions later, CBS’ “Survivor” doesn’t just endure as the pioneer of TV reality-competition, it prevails as the gold standard.

“American Idol” (premiered June 2002). It’s bigger than Simon Cowell’s proudly brandished biceps. It’s bigger than the audience’s sigh of relief when Paula Abdul finally severed her ties. It’s maybe not quite as big as it once was, but after eight editions, Fox’s “American Idol” is bigger than almost anything else on TV, while continuing to transform pop culture in a big way.

“High School Musical” (January 2006). If “American Idol” didn’t get the nation singing, this shockingly popular Disney Channel film did — that is, the nation’s teens and tweens, who, along with gorging on the original film and its sequels (with a fourth installment due next year), have put on a high school musical themselves in seemingly every auditorium in the land.

“The Osbournes” (2002-05). Poor addled Ozzy couldn’t even handle his TV remote. But viewers were able to operate theirs, and, switching to MTV in droves, they made a huge hit out of this rock star’s kookie family life. Meanwhile, its wild success crystallized a new sub-genre of reality TV, populated by the likes of Tommy Lee, Victoria Gotti, Danny Bonaduce, Hulk Hogan, Whitney Houston and so many more: celebrities masquerading as themselves while they pretend their act isn’t just another slice of show biz.

“The Sopranos” (1999-2007). Yes, it started before the millennium, but genius doesn’t always arrive at a turning point, but, instead, is one. Anyway, most of “The Sopranos” aired in 2000 and beyond — including the infamous, maddening blackout finale, which, all by itself, guaranteed this HBO mob drama a place in pop-culture perpetuity.

You might as well mothball those “Tay-Tay” and “Team Swifter” T-shirts you were printing out for the new year — Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner have split, and were never all that serious in the first place, sources told PEOPLE.

“It was never a big deal to begin with. The media made way more out of it than it is,” a source close to Swift said. “They went out on a few dates and realized this was just not going anywhere.”

A Lautner source corroborated that perspective, adding that the fact the two rising stars lived nearly a continent apart was a big factor in the low-key break-up.

“They became good friends and then went out a few times, but he lives in L.A. and she lives in Nashville and their busy schedules kept it from becoming more than it was,” the source told PEOPLE.

Representatives for Lautner and Swift had no comment.

The day after Lautner, 17, made a Dec. 12 Saturday Night Live appearance in which he “defended” Swift’s honor, he flew down to Nashville to surprise Swift for her 20th birthday party. Sometime after the party, the pair decided that it made more sense just to remain friends.

The couple, who met while filming the upcoming Valentine’s Day, had been spending time together since October. Photographers first got hip to the relationship when Lautner was spotted attending two of Swift’s concerts in Chicago, and the teen stars reunited three weeks later at an L.A. Kings hockey game.

The down-to-earth pair were photographed earlier this month getting cozy over frozen yogurt after dinner at an L.A. Benihaha, and Lautner even met the ‘rents: Swift’s mother Andrea joined the two for a relaxed dinner at Bistro Garden in Studio City in October.

Barrier rumor is kept alive by country’s fawning propaganda machine

Soldiers walk past a fence at a watch post near the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas in Paju, South Korea, on June 8.

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea’s New Year’s wish of seeing the destruction of a massive concrete wall dividing the Korean peninsula never seems to come true — because there is no such barrier.

Mentioning the wall by the North has been an odd New Year tradition begun by state founder Kim Il-sung and kept alive by a fawning propaganda machine that dares not correct a person revered as a deity. Kim died 15 years ago and is considered the state’s “eternal president.”

The Korean peninsula is divided by a 4-km (2.5 mile) wide Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) with razor wire fences on the North and South side, but features no concrete barrier as claimed by the North.

But that did not stop North Korea’s ruling party newspaper on Wednesday from coming out with its demand that the wall be demolished because “it runs diametrically counter to the desire and demand of the nation and the trend of the times.”

The idea of a Korean wall across the Cold War’s last frontier was a creation of the times, specifically, the fall of the Berlin Wall, which marked the symbolic end of the Cold War in Europe.

A few weeks after the Berlin Wall started coming down in 1989, Kim Il-sung said in a New Year’s address that Seoul had built a massive concrete wall to divide the two states, which are technically still at war.

Analysts said Kim made the claim to rally support for his state as its communist allies were fading. At the time Seoul was working to set up formal ties with the Soviet Union, then the North’s biggest benefactor.

Kim, who helped secure power by turning his country into one of the world’s most isolated and insular states, said in the speech to welcome 1990 that the wall was “a barrier of national division” preventing free travel between the two countries.

Cleric tells crowd that opposition supporters ‘belong to the party of Satan

TEHRAN, Iran - Tens of thousands of hard-line government supporters turned out for state-sponsored rallies Wednesday, some of them calling for the execution of opposition leaders as Iran’s police chief threatened to show “no mercy” in crushing any new protests by the pro-reform movement.

Pro-government rallies were staged in Shiraz, Arak, Qom, Tehran among other cities. Demonstrators at a rally in Tehran chanted “Death to Mousavi,” a reference to opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi. Some shouted “Rioter hypocrites must be executed” and held up a banner that read: “We sacrifice our blood for supreme leader.”

The government gave all civil servants and employees a day off to attend the rallies and organized buses to transport groups of schoolchildren and supporters from outlying rural areas to the protests.

Hardline cleric Ahmad Alamolhoda called opponents of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei supporters of Satan.

“Enemies of the leader, according to the Quran, belong to the party of Satan,” Alamolhoda told demonstrators in Tehran in comments broadcast on state TV. “Our war in the world is war against the opponents of the rule of the supreme leader.”

‘Era of tolerance is over’
Separately, police chief Gen. Ismail Ahmadi Moghaddam warned protesters to stay off the streets or face harsh consequences. At least eight people were killed in street violence Sunday, the country’s worst unrest since the aftermath of the disputed presidential election on June 12.

“In dealing with previous protests, police showed leniency. But given that these opponents are seeking to topple (the ruling system), there will be no mercy,” Moghaddam said, according to the official news agency IRNA. “We will take severe action. The era of tolerance is over. Anyone attending such rallies will be crushed.”

One of those killed Sunday was the nephew of opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi. Iran’s deputy police chief said Ali Mousavi was assassinated by unidentified assailants and not killed by security forces.

Ali Mousavi was buried Wednesday in a hastily organized ceremony. Authorities had taken his body from the hospital earlier in the week in what was seen as an attempt to prevent the funeral from turning into another pro-opposition protest.

The opposition says Ali Mousavi was shot and killed by security forces. But Iran’s deputy police chief, Ahmad Reza Radan, was quoted by IRNA as saying that the way he was killed suggests he was assassinated while walking. The New York Times has quoted a family friend as saying he was run over by a vehicle outside his home in an assassination.

The opposition leader and other family members attended the funeral.

The police chief said more than 500 protesters who took part in Sunday’s demonstrations have been arrested but the number may be higher since hardline Basij militiamen and intelligence agents may have apprehended more people on their own.

Government says bomb plot was professional, but execution ‘amateurish’